Brothel 'slavery' case dropped

By Maris Beck

A COURT case involving allegations of sexual slavery in Melbourne has collapsed, with charges against a woman accused of forcing Chinese women into prostitution in a licensed brothel withdrawn.

Mao Ru Zhang, 31, was due to go on trial today in the Melbourne County Court but the charges have been withdrawn after prosecutors decided there were insufficient prospects of securing a conviction. Zhang is now expected to be deported over immigration breaches.

The Candy Club, in Richmond.Credit:Mal Fairclough

Federal police had alleged that Zhang arranged for two women to go to Australia in the belief that they would study here, but then forced them into prostitution in Melbourne and Sydney.

One woman, in a police statement obtained by The Age, told police of being kept in a city apartment with other women and being afraid to leave because she was being watched continuously, and threats had been made against her family. She spoke no English and knew no one in Australia, she said.

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She said in the statement that Zhang, whom she called "Melbourne Linda", told her she had to be a sex worker up to 15 hours a day, seven days a week.

Zhang was responsible for "monitoring, managing and controlling'' the girls at brothels, including a government-licensed one at 59 York Street, South Melbourne.

The licensed manager of the brothel at the time, a Chinese woman named Lin Gao, was granted the full licence to the Candy Club in Richmond in May 2010. She has denied any involvement in wrongdoing.

Zhang was taken into custody in October 2010 over immigration breaches, when immigration agents raided the Candy Club and found her working there as a sex worker, the court was told at her committal.

She was charged in November 2010 with offences relating to sexual servitude following federal police raids on premises in South Melbourne, Richmond, Heidelberg West and Balwyn. She was committed to trial and pleaded not guilty.

But two indictable charges of sexual servitude were discontinued and two summary debt bondage charges were withdrawn on March 26.

Zhang has been transferred from the Dame Phyllis Frost women's prison to immigration detention at Maribyrnong.

A spokeswoman for the Commonwealth Department of Public Prosecutions said:

"Information became known that impacted on the evidence in the case and there was no longer reasonable prospect of conviction as required by the prosecution policy of the commonwealth. "

An AFP spokeswoman declined to comment, saying prosecutors had made the decision.